Killian Read online

  He doesn't say anything else. He just gives me that smug smile and steps away, putting space between us, and I feel myself breathe again. "See you later, cupcake."

  I walk toward the front of the store, the throbbing between my legs painfully insistent. "Don't say a word," I advise Opal before she even opens her mouth.

  She follows me into the kitchen and stands there looking at me, her arms crossed in front of her chest. "It's none of my business, but –"

  I interrupt her before she can go on. "You're right that it's none of your business."

  "Don't get sassy with me just because you're frustrated."

  My face flushes warm. I yank the freezer door open and pull out the cake I'm working on, grateful for the ice-cold air that hits my body. I need a cold shower. Or to stand in this freezer for a while. "I'm not frustrated," I yell.

  When I come back out of the freezer, Opal gives me a look. "You haven't been on a date since you moved here."

  "I've hardly been in this town long enough to go on a date."

  Opal snorts. "When's the last time you went on a date before that?"

  "That's irrelevant." I begin rolling out fondant. "I have a child."

  "So you're not allowed to date for the rest of your life?"

  "I'm not interested in dating that guy," I protest.

  "I wasn't suggesting you date the Saint boy," she says, looking over her shoulder as she pushes open the swinging door. Then she winks.

  "Opal!" I squeal, following her. "Saint? That man is no saint." That's for damn sure.

  "That's his name, honey."

  Killian Saint.

  I can hardly believe Opal just suggested I hook up with him. The idea is ridiculous, and not just because he's an arrogant ass. And not just because I'm a parent of a seven-year-old who doesn't need to get romantically involved with anyone. Or because I'm a new business owner who needs to focus on her business. It's ludicrous because I've had a grand total of two sexual partners in my life: my dead husband and a less-than-satisfying one-night stand three years ago. Dating is not anywhere on the horizon for me, and hooking up with someone isn't even in the realm of possibilities.

  No matter how wet it made me when he whispered in my ear.

  I want to hear you moan it.

  Arrogant ass.

  8

  Killian

  My heart is pounding in my chest as I back out of my parking spot in front of Lily's store. "Pounding" isn't even the right word for it. It's fucking hammering its boom-boom-boom in my chest, seconds from exploding. I drive down Main Street and out of town like I'm being chased by the cops, adrenaline coursing through my veins as if I'm fixing to fight someone.

  Except fighting is the last thing I want to do. My dick is rock hard, pressing against the zipper of my jeans and aching for Lily. I had a damn hard-on in that store of hers the second she said my name. When the hell has that ever happened before?

  Never is the answer. I've never gotten a boner from some chick just saying my name.

  It's the way she said it – breathy, like she was whispering it as I put my tongue between her legs, her hands gripping my hair and pulling me against her.

  I had to hightail it out of the store before I put my lips on hers again. I bet she thinks I'm a total jackass for telling her I wanted her to moan my name, but hell, that was the honest truth.

  My tire goes off the edge of the road and I right it again. I think all the blood in my body is between my damn legs right now.

  I don't even make it inside the house. The second I pull into the driveway and turn off the ignition, I push the seat back and unbutton my jeans.

  "Killian." Lily stands inches away from me, her face upturned. Her tongue flicks over her lower lip as she looks at me, and I don't wait for her to say anything else. When I cover her mouth with mine, she moans.

  She moans into my damn mouth.

  I spit into my hand, closing my eyes and resting my head against the seat as I stroke my hard cock. I practically groan at the sensation, even more so when I picture Lily in my head.

  The bakery is empty. No customers. The windows are wide open and I don't give a shit. I flick open the button on her jeans and yank them over her hips. The instant my fingers go between her legs and find her wetness, she moans again, louder this time. I pull my lips away, my eyes searching hers for any sign that she doesn't want this. But she grips my biceps, her fingertips digging into my skin as I thrust my fingers inside her tight wet pussy.

  "Oh my God, Killian." Her voice is breathy, just like before. Her hand moves to my jeans and I shake my head.

  "Not yet," I growl. I want her to come on me. I want to make her moan my name, right here, right now, gripping my arms as I plunge my fingers inside her. I want her to wrap her thighs around my head as I bury my tongue between her legs. I want her tight wet pussy on my cock.

  But more than anything, I want to make this girl come. Over and over.

  I picture her lips forming my name as I stroke my cock faster and faster, the pre-cum dripping from the tip as a series of images flashes in my head like a movie reel.

  Lily's face as she comes, her pussy tightening around my fingers as I stroke her.

  Lily naked, stretched across one of the tables in the bakery, her hands gripping my hair as she holds my head tightly against her pussy. I pull her clit into my mouth, sucking her until she's whimpering my name over and over like some kind of mantra.

  Lily against the wall, her legs wrapped around my waist as I plunge my cock inside her over and over.

  "Tell me you love it," I order. "Tell me you love feeling me bare inside you. Tell me you want me to fill you up with my cum."

  She moans her response. "Do it," she says. "Please."

  It's the word "please" that makes me come. I groan loudly as I finish, imagining myself coming inside her.

  When I pry open my eyes, adrenaline still flows through my body and my cock is still hard. This girl is going to be the death of me. I feel like I'm a horny teenage boy with the biggest case of blue balls the world has ever seen.

  The right thing to do – the sensible thing – would be to stay the hell away from the girl who owns the bakery, the one with the chip on her shoulder that tells me she's been hurt before. The girl who has a kid and probably a shitload of baggage.

  That's what I should do.

  Fuck it. I've never been sensible anyway.

  Lily is staring at me like I've got three eyes, that same look on her face that she seems to get a lot around me. It's the one where her cheeks are lightly flushed and she's glaring at me like her head is about to explode.

  I stayed out of the bakery the past two days. I tried to be logical, I really did. Then I came in this morning and Opal was struggling to keep up with the customers. I couldn't watch while she tried to manage shit on her own. It wasn't right. So I jumped in to help her out.

  At the register, Opal leans toward me. "Sugar, would you be a doll and box me up three vanilla cupcakes with raspberry frosting and "

  "Two of the chocolate almond mocha cupcakes, three of the lemon meringue cupcakes, and a bagel with cream cheese, not boxed with the cupcakes," a customer says.

  "Mornin', sunshine," I whisper as Lily passes by me behind the counter.

  She puts a coffee cup on the counter. "What are you doing here?" she asks, her voice excessively polite. But her nostrils flare.

  "Working," I say, sliding open the door to the display case.

  "What do you mean, 'working'?"

  "Opal hired me." I reach a gloved hand for the lemon meringue cupcakes. How many were there again?

  "She said lemon meringue," Lily points out. "Those are lemon-frosted."

  "How many kinds of lemon cupcakes do you have?" I grumble, placing three in the container.

  Lily ignores me. "Hand me the cupcake box."

  "I don't think so.” I stand up.

  The woman waiting for the cupcakes giggles. "I'll say them one at a time," she says, her voice sugar sweet. Shit, s
he's practically batting her eyes at me. "I shouldn't have said everything at once and confused you."

  Beside me, Lily clears her throat. "I'll be happy to take over.”

  "Oh no. I think he has it handled. Besides, a man giving me cupcakes is the best start to a morning I've had in a long time."

  I look at Lily smugly and she rolls her eyes in response. "Three mocha almond?" I ask.

  "Yes.” The customer giggles again. The constant giggling makes her sound like an airheaded bimbo, but I don't tell her that. Mentally I congratulate myself on my excellent self-control. It's been almost two hours that I've been working in a fucking coffee shop with actual customers - actual real-life people - and I haven't cursed a single one of them out. Really, my restraint should be commended. I practically deserve an employee-of-the-year award already. In fact, I should probably make that suggestion to Lily.

  I finish filling the cupcake box and wordlessly hand it to the giggling blonde, who stands on her tiptoes to lean in over the top of the display case. "Are you going to be working here every morning?"

  "No. Unfortunately, he's helping out temporarily," Lily interrupts. "Just for today."

  There's an unmistakable edge to her voice that's more than just irritation at discovering me behind the front counter. Is she jealous of the blonde?

  "She's incorrect," I tell the blonde. "It's not temporary."

  "Oh, good. Then I'll be seeing you bright and early tomorrow."

  "Opal, do you have these customers all set?" Lily asks, her voice excessively polite.

  "Go on.” Opal waves her off. "But before you get your knickers in a twist, just know that Killian has been very helpful this morning."

  Lily grunts. "I'm sure." She gestures at me to follow her to the kitchen, her nostrils doing that flaring thing again.

  "This is the second time you've dragged me back here," I note once we're back in the kitchen. "If you wanted to be alone with me so badly, you could have just asked."

  "I do not want alone time with you," Lily protests, her eyes wide. "Why are you behind the counter in my store?"

  "Working.” I shrug. I cross my arms as I look at her. "You've got a 'help wanted' sign hanging in the window."

  "You are not help."

  "Well, now, that's just rude."

  "You know what I mean. You're not in the market for a job making coffee and handling cupcakes."

  I can't hide the smile that tugs at the edges of my lips. "I was hoping to handle one particular cupcake."

  I didn't think it was possible for her eyes to fly open wider, but they do. "There's not going to be any handling of anything," she says. But she pulls her lower lip between her teeth.

  "Opal thinks I'm a terrific fit for this place," I point out.

  Lily's eyes narrow. "Opal doesn't have hiring authority. And you are not a good fit for this place."

  "Because I'm a man?" I ask. "That's just flat-out discrimination."

  Lily groans in exasperation. I wonder if that's just her thing, or if she does it only around me. "Because you're a huge hulk of a man who looks like a lumberjack."

  "Hunk," I correct.

  "What?" My interruption stops her tirade, and she pushes away the errant strand of hair that flops out of her ponytail into her face. That ponytail. It makes me want to pull it. My dick twitches, pressing against the zipper of my jeans at the mere thought of my hand gripping her hair as she rides me.

  "You said hulk but you really meant hunk.”

  "I definitely meant hulk. That apron looks ridiculous on you and you are not the kind of person who does well with people."

  "Maybe I like people," I lie. That's the furthest fucking thing from the truth. Except for my brothers, I have no interest in interacting with the citizens of West Bend. Solitude is just fine with me. It's just that this girl makes me crazy. I have this irresistible urge to push her buttons. And hell, being up at the cabin alone has been boring lately.

  She laughs under her breath. "You hate people."

  "You don't know that."

  She cocks her head to the side. "Oh, please. It's written all over you. The last thing I need is you scaring off my customers."

  I step closer to her, and she doesn't back away. She looks up at me, her face defiant. Fuck, I want to put my mouth on hers again. When I kissed her before, she tasted like strawberries and summer and frosting and – now I can't stop thinking about frosting her naked body.

  "I promise I won't even scare off your customers. Only the asshole ones."

  "See?" she squeaks. "You're doing it again. I don't even know you and you seem to have made it your mission to get involved in my store out of some misguided notion that you're protecting me."

  "Wrong." I step closer to her. She's standing against the counter now, the metal edge pressing into her ass.

  "Wrong about what?" She looks up at me. Her voice is softer, and when she runs her tongue along her lower lip, I have the nearly irresistible urge to bite that lip.

  "You're wrong about why I'm here."

  "Why are you here, then?"

  "Because I want you in my bed. And on this counter. And up against the wall."

  She inhales deeply, her breasts rising under her apron. For a second, I think she moves closer to me, like she wants me to kiss her. "You're barking up the wrong tree, caveman."

  I raise my eyebrow. "You're not into men?"

  A look of confusion flutters across her face, and then she sets her jaw. "Of course that's what you think."

  "You're the one who said I was barking up the wrong tree." I shrug. There isn't any part of me that thinks Lily isn't into men, not with the way she looks at me like she's daring me to touch her.

  "So that must mean I'm into women?"

  "You tell me."

  "Are you asking your employer about her sexual preference or her sex life?" she asks. "Because that would be so far beyond inappropriate that I'd have to fire you."

  "You're saying you've hired me?"

  "I didn't say that," she blurts out.

  "You did say just you were my employer," I point out helpfully.

  "I was speaking in theoretical terms."

  "Careful. This caveman doesn't understand big words."

  She narrows her eyes at me. "You're juvenile."

  I lean in close to her, my lips near her ear the way they were the other day. "Good thing you're not my employer, then. Because it would be really inappropriate if I were to tell you that I can't stop thinking about how much I'd like taste you. Or how much I'd like to feel you on my tongue."

  She inhales sharply, so sharply that I can hear her breath, and the sound makes me hard. I pull away and she looks at me for a long minute without speaking. Honestly, I can't decide if she's going to slap me across the face or not. She should slap me across the face; I totally deserve it.